THE LEADERSHIP OF SHEPHERDING

A Sermon preached by the Rev. Michael Anderson Bullock

[Acts 9:36-43; Revelation 7P9-17; John 10:22-30]

The Fourth Sunday in the season of Easter – today – it always contains the tender images of the “Good Shepherd”.  In fact, liturgically the Fourth Sunday of Easter is referred to as “Good Shepherd Sunday”, even as it also marks the midpoint in the Eastertide season.   Always using the tenth chapter of John’s gospel, the day’s focus is specifically on the risen Jesus as our “Good Shepherd”.  An aware St. Philip’s worshipper can also expect to hear the 23rd Psalm read -- or sung, along with some other very tender Irish tunes about the tending nature of Jesus, our “Good Shepherd”.  That this day is also “Mother’s Day” has the capacity to put us in emotional overdrive.  So it is with gratitude for your generous financial support that St. Philip’s provides tissues at the end of each pew!

Yet, as emotionally charged as this day can be, feelings simply but powerfully always point to a deeper truth, to the extent that not all of us (in fact) are “good shepherds” – “good” in the sense of being willing and able to follow Jesus’ example,  and contrary to the President’s desire to increase the nation’s birth rate, let it be said that not all women are called to give birth; nor is birthing a child the central qualification for being a “good” mother.  This is to say that there is something underneath whatever emotions (good or not-so-good) that this double-edged day contains.  And even though Easter day can seem a ways off now, we do well to wonder what the image of Jesus as the “Good Shepherd” has to do with our Easter life.

What I want to propose to you is that shepherding in the name of Jesus -- crucified and raised -- is about leadership – the kind of leadership that reflects the resurrected life of Jesus who is God’s incarnate shepherd for us all.

So, let me begin my answer by first offering a definition of “leadership” that I have found clarifying.  For its easy memorization, this definition can be broken into four, small parts.  Here they are.  Leadership is: 1) taking responsibility 2) for equipping others 3) to achieve shared purposes 4) in the face of uncertainty.  Taken as a whole, “leadership is taking responsibility for equipping others to achieve shared purposes in the face of uncertainty.”

One of the things I like about this definition is that it is concretely specific, not amorphously abstract, not bureaucratically stale.  More to the point, this notion of “leadership” speaks distinctively and specifically to how we might promote living together in relationship, as God’s Easter people, in a Good Friday world.1

As I hope you gleaned from last Sunday’s parish meeting, your Vestry leadership sees shepherding as one of the high priority ministries in this parish’s next-level life and ministry.  Shepherding is a means by which we at St. Philip’s will evolve from what that meeting identified as our need to move beyond our historic habits of “survival” into a community that knows how to “thrive” – moving from the habit of treading water to purposeful swimming.  And here is the point.

Like many of you, I am aware of the cultural and social discussion about how many people in our time feel lonely and isolated, living lives that lack meaningful purpose.  From this stultification, what else might we expect than an angry and violent reaction to such solitary confinement?  As a parish priest, I have regularly encountered folks who seek a setting in which they might belong in a safe and trustworthy place in which to set their roots for nourishment and growth.  While such expectations of the church are certainly legitimate, too often they are unrequited.  We at St. Philip’s intend to do something concrete about this painful gap between the need to belong and what it takes to belong.  I am posing to you that at its heart this is about the leadership of shepherding.

Personally, I am a son of a post-World War II father, who rose as a corporate executive, moving and uprooting his young family many times for the next employment opportunity.  While my father provided for all of us well-beyond his own background’s experience, I, nonetheless, learned from my dad’s success to hate the question, “Where are you from?”  As I have experienced with the various rose gardens I have planted in the various places I have lived, the truth I know in myself is that transplantation always contains the risk of loss because roots and the life they promise need tending and not so much-repeated replanting.  Belonging requires a level of emotional stability before growth may occur.

It is, therefore, a big part of the church’s life and mission to confront the need for belonging by offering a safe and fertile place in which to sink one’s roots and to promote fruitful growth.  In the light of Jesus as the “Good Shepherd”, the issue is how we convey his tending, caring shepherding.  It is in this vein that I am taken by one particular thing our Lord declares in today’s gospel: namely, that in his shepherding, “[n]o one will snatch [a member of his flock] from his hand."2  Translated into English, the Greek word for “snatch” tellingly means possessing violently, which gets to the heart of shepherding and its purposeful mission.

There are those among us – some of whom we have voted for, some of whom influence our social setting – who pose as shepherds, but their motivation is not the care of the flock but to gain the power to be able to “snatch” with impunity for the expansion of their own power.  Jesus, God’s own shepherd, declares that “no one can snatch what God has given to me out of my hands because the Father and I are one.”3  This is to say that God is our shepherd and Jesus, God in human terms, reveals the nature of God’s own shepherding care for us all.  And unlike those who merely pose as shepherds – but are more akin to wolves in a shepherd’s garb, Jesus (as God’s enfleshed shepherd) lays down his life for God’s flock so that not even death can “snatch” any of us from his tending hand.

So, what might this type of shepherding ministry look like among us?  How might we meet the hungering for belonging we all have?  How might St. Philip’s offer its life and mission as a safe and trustworthy place for people to belong to God in life-giving ways?

As Senior Warden Becky Taylor outlined at last Sunday’s parish meeting, we are beginning to respond to this need in a more organized and sustained way.  We are engaging in the building of a “Newcomers Ministry.  We already do a pretty good job at some elements of this ministry.  For instance, we are remarkably open and welcoming to all who join us.  St. Philip’s is a genuinely warm and friendly place.  Yet, there are other elements of a Newcomer Ministry that are less strong.  But let me step back and identify what I believe are the elements that make a faithful and effective “Newcomers Ministry”.

In my experience, there are four guiding parts to a “Newcomers Ministry”.  The first is inviting.  The second is welcoming.  The third is orienting.  The fourth is incorporation.  As I said, St. Philip’s is good at “welcoming”, but we are much less confident about the “inviting”.  Again with reference to last Sunday’s meeting, where we read about St. Philip’s famous invitation to “Come and See”.  Our first step in offering a sense of belonging to new people is to invite folks, especially those we already know, with folks who already trust us.  We want to share what we know about following Jesus and in becoming Easter people.  “Come and See” is not only the mark of a crucial invitation, but it is also the first step in shepherding and in being a shepherd to those we invite.  Shepherding invitationally is the heart of this emerging program.

And here is the deal with Newcomer shepherding.  Invite someone and take on the commitment of shepherding them.  Act as a sponsor, someone who will guide and shepherd the new person for sixty days – just sixty days! This is not a long-term responsibility – just sixty days of helping someone new to find their way among us and to gain a level of confidence to move on to the next steps of being oriented and then incorporated into our community’s life, mission, and ministry.

 “Come and See.”  The important touchpoint is the invitation, which is the personal and humane offer to “Come” among us and “See” what makes us tick and also to share with us what makes the newcomer tick.

I think that the invitation to “Come and See” has historically been a stumbling block for the likes of us.  Our invitation to “Come and See” and our shepherding are meant to convey a safe opportunity to explore what it means to have faith, to ask questions, to develop faith by watching others continually grow into their Easter faith and life.

In terms of the last two elements of the Newcomers Ministry -- the orientation and the incorporation, by showing up, new people will see who we are and what we do.  They will discover the experience of being able to call St. Philip’s “home”.  Those new, developing spiritual roots (ones we shepherds have helped to establish in them) will lead our newcomers to be a part of our sustaining common life, to be oriented and incorporated as God’s own.

And this will be how we reflect the Good Shepherd’s shepherding.  And the result will be that no one will be able to “snatch” any of us away.  Good News!  Amen.

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1.  Bishop Barbara Harris’ refrain with reference to the book Easter People In A Good Friday World: Making Wise Moral Decisions by James B. Hofrenning

2. John 10:28

3. John 10:30